AP File Photo The Buffalo Sabres traded right-handed defenseman Michael Kesselring and the 27th pick in the 2026 NHL draft for the 20th pick in next week's draft on Wednesday.

Just about a year ago the Buffalo Sabres traded JJ Peterka to the Utah Mammoth for defenseman Michael Kesselring and forward Josh Doan.

After an injury-plagued season that never let Kesselring find his spot in the Sabres lineup, he is on the move again on Wednesday with the Sabres sending him and pick No. 27 in next week’s draft to the San Jose Sharks for the 20th pick.

The original trade that sent Peterka to Utah in exchange for Kesselring and Doan has not worked out in the way either party imagined.

Kesselring was thought to be a piece that could step into the Buffalo Top 4 and allow Owen Power to take the next step in his game. Instead the Sabres group of Rasmus Dahlin, Mattias Samuelsson, Power and Bowen Byram stuck together and helped end the team’s playoff drought while Kesselring just played a measly 34 games with only two assists and one playoff appearance.

The 26-year-old Kesselring was plagued by injuries and his absence was just plainly not missed by the Sabres as depth like Conor Timmins, Zach Metsa, Jacob Bryson and Logan Stanley stepped in when needed.

Originally, it appeared Buffalo lost a big piece in Peterka who finished second in team scoring his final year and he would help put the Mammoth over the top.

Utah did get over the top and returned to the playoffs, but it was not Peterka in a driving role. Peterka’s role with the Mammoth varied much from his time in Buffalo and he put up just 25 goals and 22 assists for 47 points despite providing 68 points for the Sabres a year prior.

As it turns out, Doan was the best piece in the trade despite the focal point being Peterka and Kesselring. The 24-year-old forward broke out in Buffalo with a massive jump from 19 points to 52 this season and he added 10 more points in 13 playoff games.

Coupled with the depth and winning the trade by acquiring the best piece, Buffalo had an easy choice to offload Kesselring and in doing so improved position in next week’s draft.

With Kevyn Adams as General Manager it was easy to guess that there was likely nothing big in the works and this trade could be written off as a move of an unwanted asset.

Jarmo Kekalainen is much more unpredictable and could very easily be making more moves before free agency hits. If the Sabres intend to keep the pick we will get to see Kekalainen’s approach to the draft and how it might differ from Adams. But no matter the strategy there are several great players bound to be available at No. 20 to bolster a prospect pool on the verge of graduating its best talent.

Selecting the best player available has paid dividends for the Sabres in recent years with Zach Benson falling to them in 2023 and Konsta Helenius doing the same in 2024, both players that were able to make impacts as teenagers. Noah Ostlund and Jiri Kulich will both figure into the Sabres Top 9 forwards next year — Matt Savoie will do the same in Edmonton — and Radim Mrtka is the team’s top defensive prospect who has plenty of trade value.

Refilling the offensive prospect cupboard is a great scenario for the Sabres at No. 20, while No. 27 would have had them taking the leftovers or a bigger risk.

Through my personal draft rankings, the 20th best prospect is right-handed defenseman Brek Liske, but he will likely be a Day 2 pick. The forwards I have in that region are Nikita Klepov, J.P. Hurlbert, Elton Hermansson, Jack Hextall, Adam Valentini and Marcus Nordmark.

Then in the consolidated consensus rankings according to eliteprospects.com, Ilia Morozov is the 20th best prospect with Hurlbert, Hermansson, Klepov, Mathis Preston and Yegor Shilov in that region at forward, while defensemen Malte Gustafsson, Xavier Villeneuve and Juho Piiparinen could fall around there.

The last five drafts with Adams I have nailed down the Sabres first pick from no-brainer Power in 2021, Savoie in 2022, Benson in 2023, then Helenius in 2024 and Mrtka last year. It is much harder to assess how Kekalainen will pick if he even keeps the selection, but looking at his history there is a chance of Russians coming to Buffalo.

With Columbus in 2020, Kekalainen went way off the consensus draft board to pick Russian Yegor Chinakov at No. 21, in 2018 he hit with pick No. 49 taking Russian Kirill Marchenko and with the Blue Jackets his best players were Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky.

He also went off board in 2018 with Liam Foudy in the first round, but while rebuilding Columbus from 2021-23 he stayed with the consensus taking players like Kent Johnson, Cole Sillinger, David Jiricek, Denton Mateychuk and Adam Fantilli.

This group of Sabres now falls under his drafting habits when the team is adding depth, so it is likely they will take players who can play depth roles or could yield big upside some day.

In my Sabres draft article next week I will look more closely at those options, but the Kesselring trade for now just adds to the number of quality prospects available when Buffalo picks.